Fraunce was educated at Shrewsbury and at St. John’s College, Cambridge, where his Latin comedy Victoria, dedicated to Sidney, was probably written. He was called to the bar at Gray’s Inn in 1588 and then apparently practiced in the court of the Welsh marches. After the death of Sidney, Fraunce was sponsored by Sidney’s sister Mary Herbert, countess of Pembroke. His last work was published in 1592, and nothing more is known until his death in 1633.